people in their early and middle teens, all written by Australians, but covering a pretty wide global swath.

"Six And Silver" will be enjoy- ed by the outdoor-minded mop- pet. Joan Phipson (whose "Good Luck to the Rider" won a prize last year) writes about a Sydney

girl's visits to a farm in north-

western New South Wales.

Riding and hiking bring adven- tures. The narrative is unforced and keeps most pleasantly to the probabilities.

"The First Walkabout" tells how the small, dark Negritos reached and spread across Aus- tralia during the Ice Age and be- came the first human inhabitants. They were driven south by fiercer hunters, and the flight of a tribe is reconstructed, forming the narrative.

The story is written in a quiet yet vivid way. Mr. Tindale is an Adelaide Museum ethnologist, but that need frighten no one.

in "A Fortune for the Brave," the scene moves between Eng- land and Tasmania, where an aimless youth migrate» to stay with more feckless relatives. He learns to love farming, inherits a small island and is involved in a coastal treasure hunt.

The story contains fairly subtle studies of character, and will in- terest mid-teenagers

Kylie Tennant has made a jauntj adaptation of the "Long John Silver" scenario, which brings back into action every pirate R L S lett unscuppered Young Jim Hawkins is captured again, this time with a girl com- panion of his own age

Pegleg Silver, however, has re foinied with time (except for an occasional nasty outburst of tempeij and is now Jims rescuei and tuend, even sharing with lum the latest find of doubloons and diamonds

The filth of the "Simon Black" senes lakes him to China and provides bnskly enough the kind of ¿aventine dream many bo\s like in these technological diys The aviator and his mates ha\e the assignment of impersonating uranium smugglers in older to foil a diabolical conspiracy